Eskil Vogt’s “The Innocents”
The Innocents (2021)
A tense horror on the dark side of childhood which plays like “Lord of the Flies”, Anton Leader’s “Children of the Damned” and Josh Trank’s “Chronicle” with a down-to-earth Swedish sensibility that heightens the stakes
Set on a Swedish housing estate, the film opens with Ida(Rakel Lenora Fløttum) and her non-verbal, older sister Anna(Alva Brynsmo Ramstad) in the backseat of their parents’ car as they drive to their new home. Ida pinches Anna and though her sister doesn’t react, it’s a cruel act. This sets the tone for what will follow as the film explores childrens’ uncalibrated morality. Arriving at the apartments, Ida is isolated until she meets a similarly lonely boy, Ben(Sam Ashraf) while her sister Anna makes a connection with Aisha(Mina Yasmin Bremseth Asheim), but something is different about the children, something not intrinsically evil but with potential for terrible consequences.
First, the child actors are phenominal across the board. I can’t really say enough good things about the performances that Vogt gets out of these kids. We spend most of the film in their world and the perspective is always from this viewpoint with adults existing on another plane.
Though set in the long days of summer, the tone of the film is very much like Tomas Alfredson’s “Let the Right One In” and there’s a simmering peril that escalates through to the end, slowly and mercilessly ratcheting up as it goes. Be warned, there are some very disturbing and hard to watch moments in the film and like most European cinema, the kids aren’t safe because they’re kids.
In terms of the script, it delves into childhood and how we set our moral compasses and questions whether the dark deeds of that time can cleansed from the slate. The only thing that I can fault is an unease with how the non-white characters are handled in comparison to their caucasian counterparts. It would be interesting to know more about what motivated Vogt’s decisions while writing the script. I had a similar reaction to elements of his script for “The Worst Person in the World” which he co-wrote with Joachim Trier telling a woman’s story as written by two men.
Overall, “The Innocents” is a well-executed, tense horror of many layers that can stand tall among some of the best horror in recent years. As per my usual advice, avoid the trailer as it gives far too much away.
